


You have a choice, pretty boy

by avidbeader



Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: Alternate Scene in an Alternate Universe, Attempted Rape/Non-Con, Garrison life, M/M, Pre-Canon
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-04-04
Updated: 2017-04-04
Packaged: 2018-10-14 22:48:01
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,125
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10545644
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/avidbeader/pseuds/avidbeader
Summary: Alternate version of Chapter 25 of "Strengths and Weaknesses" by Latart0903, posted with her permission.





	

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Latart0903](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Latart0903/gifts).
  * Inspired by [Strengths and weaknesses](https://archiveofourown.org/works/9216185) by [Latart0903](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Latart0903/pseuds/Latart0903). 



> So, I have become an enthusiastic fan of Latart0903's story, "Strengths and Weaknesses". It's a slow-burn development of Shiro and Keith into a couple pre-Kerberos, loaded with great detail, lots of emotional beats, excellent character development, a small host of engaging original characters, and enough explicit smut to keep things very interesting. While I remain a multi-shipper in the Voltron fandom, this story is responsible for putting Sheith at the top of my list. Before you read this, you need to set aside some time and go read her story first.
> 
> After chapter 23, several of us who were reading and commenting expressed our fears over Keith being in danger from a guy who saw Shiro as competition. And I couldn't turn my brain off from the possibilities and wound up writing my own version while we waited. Latart's was quite intense and satisfying without her having to add any new tags. Mine went just a little farther in the threat department.

 

Keith went back to his dorm on Wednesday, feeling drained but accomplished. Moore had run him through an alternating series of medium and advanced training sims and now he was above his pre-suspension average. He wanted to call Shiro, but Shiro was in a Kerberos planning session with the Holts and had no idea when it would be done. Keith settled for tackling the upcoming paper in Astronomy and Navigation and set up his books and laptop on the sofa across from his bed. He changed into a tee shirt and pajama pants, assuming that he was likely here for the evening.

 

The knock at his door made him jump. He frowned as he moved toward it. Celine usually announced herself, as did Shiro. He paused and called, “Who’s there?”

 

“Hey, Kogane. It’s Rivali.”

 

His eyebrows going up into his hair, Keith opened the door to find Rivali standing there with two pizza boxes and a grocery bag that appeared to hold a six-pack of beer. “Saw you made up all your suspension scores. Thought I’d bring a celebration by.”

 

“Um, thanks, I guess. But I can’t drink tonight. I’ve got a paper to finish and early class tomorrow.”

 

Rivali shrugged. “More for me, then.” He started forward and Keith backpedaled before he could be knocked over by the larger man. He set his load on Keith’s desk, took the beer, and shoved it into the mini-fridge, pulling out a bottle of Coors and twisting the cap off. “Want one of these Cokes?”

 

“Ah, no. Thanks.” Keith was beginning to feel very uncomfortable. Rivali was dressed casually in jeans and a baseball jersey, his hair up in its usual man-bun. But there was something in his demeanor that Keith didn’t like. Was Rivali mad that Keith had gone to Moore to supervise his last round of makeup sims?

 

Rivali set his beer down on the fridge and produced a few paper plates that had been between the pizza boxes. “I got a pepperoni and an everything pizza. Usually covers all the bases. Which one d’you want?”

 

“Um, I don’t do onions.” He took a deep breath. “Look, Thanks and all, and I mean, really, thanks for the help in the sims, but I have to get this paper finished. It’s in my hardest class. I need to focus.” Keith turned to open his door.

 

The tattooed arm snaked around him from behind and Keith’s pulse rate jumped in alarm. Rivali’s voice sounded in his ear. “You sure about that, Keith?”

 

Keith pulled away, trying not to show his nervousness. “I’m sure. I do better alone when it’s book work.”

 

Rivali leaned in, backing him against the door. “I think you need to take a break. You owe me some…consideration after I gave you my time in the sims and I am ready to collect.” He slid the security lock into place.

 

“I don’t…what are you talking about?”

 

“You spend a lot of time with the junior officers, kiddo. Rumors are everywhere that you trade…favors…with them to get extra flying practice. There’s no way someone as young as you is that good without help.” He leaned closer, putting his lips to Keith’s ear. “So I want my turn.”

 

Keith jerked away, his face growing hot as his anger rose. “That’s bullshit.”

 

“Is it? Everyone’s seen you with Shirogane’s little band. They call you pet names, treat you like their cute little puppy. Even the cadets know…that’s what that fight was about, wasn’t it?”

 

Keith’s phone pinged a signal for an incoming text and he ducked under Rivali’s arm and dived for it. Rivali followed, reading over Keith’s shoulder.

 

**I haven’t seen you in like 3 days. Let’s go get ice cream before curfew.**

“Who is that?”

 

“M-my best friend. She’s in the engineering program.”

 

“Put her off. We’re not done.”

 

With trembling hands, Keith typed in a reply.

 

**Can’t, Celia. Staying in. Too much work tonight. Tomorrow okay?**

He hit _Send_ and prayed.

 

\-----

 

Celine read the text, then frowned. Something wasn’t right. She re-read and her eyes widened as she realized. She thought frantically on how to let him know she understood.

 

**Fine. I’ll go see if Neil can come instead.**

Without waiting to see if he replied, she jumped to her phone app and dialed. She ran over the slightly confused “Hi, Celine?”

 

“Neil, I need your brother’s phone number! Keith’s in trouble!”

 

Bless him, he didn’t argue. “Texting it to you right now!”

 

“Thank you!” She hung up and opened her messenger to hit the number.

 

\-----

 

Shiro wrapped up with the Holts and left the conference room. He was debating whether to text Keith first or simply go find him at his dorm when his name was called. He turned to see Woolf and Medina and walked over to them. “What are you two up to?”

 

Medina shrugged. “Waiting on you. Got time to grab a beer or something? Feels like we haven’t seen you in forever.”

 

“I guess I could. Let me touch base with Keith.” Shiro pulled out his phone and frowned at the notice of an email from Iverson. “Damn. He never lets up.” Shiro opened the email to read it.

 

Woolf’s phone rang and he pulled it out. He looked baffled at the unfamiliar number. “Who the hell is this?” He answered and put the phone to his ear. “Sergeant Woolf.”

 

“Oh, thank god you answered! This is Celine! I need your help, Keith’s in trouble!”

 

“Wait, what? What do you mean trouble?”

 

“I don’t know exactly, but he used our roofie code, so I know it’s bad!”

 

“I’m totally lost here. Shiro’s with me, I’m putting you on speakerphone.”

 

Shiro looked up at that and he and Medina huddled in.

 

“Shiro, we need to get to Keith’s room NOW. He needs help, he used our code—”

 

“What code?”

 

They heard a frustrated snarl from her. “When we go clubbing or to a party, we have a code. If one of us needs to get the other’s attention over something suspicious, like if we saw someone put something in our drink, he calls me Celia instead of Celine and I call him Keifer instead of Keith. He answered my text a few minutes ago and used Celia! He said he was staying in to do work, but I think someone’s in there with him!”

 

“We’re on our way!” Shiro replied and the three of them took off running.

 

\-----

 

Rivali grabbed the hand that held his phone and read Celine’s reply. He nodded. “That’s a good boy. Now, let’s make sure we aren’t interrupted anymore.” He took the phone and powered it down, tossing it onto the sofa. He held onto Keith’s hand, running his thumb over the wrist.

 

Keith shrank from him. He didn’t know why Celine would mention Neil. She hadn’t said anything about Woolf’s brother since he left for Seattle…

 

Woolf. She was trying to tell him she was going for help. He had to stall.

 

Keith tried to disengage his hand. “You know, maybe I’ll take that beer after all. One won’t hurt.”

 

Rivali smiled and pulled Keith with him over to the minifridge. “That’s a good idea. You relax a little, this will go easier.” He set a second bottle next to the first.

 

“Look, I really don’t do what you think I do! I’ve just made friends with some of the officers!”

 

“Uh-huh. Why don’t you tell me how good of a friend you are? Good enough to be off campus the same weekends as Shirogane? Good enough that the Radio Bar bouncer routinely lets you in even though you’re underage? Good enough that even a ditzy blonde like Miss Alexis in the PR department thought you two were an item?”

 

“I am not answering you! It’s none of your fucking business.” Keith yanked his hand away, his thoughts racing over the revelations that he and Shiro hadn’t been as discreet as they thought.

 

Rivali darted forward and snatched a handful of Keith’s shirt, trying to haul him back. Keith resisted and the seam at one shoulder gave way with a loud ripping sound. The extra give sent him back farther than he expected and his legs hit his bedframe. He fell back onto the mattress and Rivali instantly pounced on him.

 

“Get off me! Get the fuck off me!” Keith shifted from unease and anger to terror. His only shot was going to be making enough noise that his neighbors could hear. “I said no!” He tried to bang on the wall, but Rivali caught his hand. He grabbed Keith’s other hand and pinned both above his head, holding his wrists down in one large hand and trailing the other down Keith’s arm.

 

“You don’t get to say no after I give you my time and my expertise. Now you pay up, just like you do for Shirogane.”

 

“No! Get off! Get—” Rivali brought his free hand down hard over Keith’s mouth, stifling his shouts. Keith thrashed frantically but the older man dropped his weight, holding him in place and driving his breath from his lungs. He leaned in, putting his lips to Keith’s ear.

 

“You have a choice, pretty boy. You can give me what I want and I’ll be gentle about it and then it’s over. Or you can keep fighting me and I can make it rough on you. And then I tell Iverson that you’ve been sleeping with the juniors for months, since before you turned eighteen. Including Shirogane.  That will get him kicked off the Kerberos mission and you kicked out of the Garrison.”

 

\-----

 

They converged at the door to Keith’s residence. Celine pulled ahead as they tore up the stairs. Shiro was trying to raise Keith on his phone as he ran and getting no response. Medina and Woolf didn’t know where they were going and had to follow.

 

She ran down the hall to Keith’s room and pounded on the door. “Keith! Are you in there? Let us in!”

 

\-----

 

Keith inhaled sharply as he heard Celine knocking and shouting frantically for him. Rivali growled and tightened his grip on Keith's mouth. He whispered, “Not one fucking peep out of you. You’re not here.”

 

“Keith, please open the door!” She rattled the latch against the deadbolt.

 

A babble of lower voices joined hers, and there were stronger fists on his door. Celine’s voice rose again and was joined by Shiro’s, shouting his name.

 

\-----

 

“Celine, are you sure he’s in there?” Shiro threw his fist against the door once more.

 

The commotion had brought the attention of the students in the surrounding rooms, opening their doors and looking out. One boy in the room to the right spoke up. “He’s in there. I heard someone knock a little while ago and then Kogane was shouting a few minutes ago. I was debating calling security but it got really quiet.”

 

“Do it,” Woolf replied. “Here, Medina, help me. Kick, on three. One, two, three!”

 

They drove their feet into the door and the lock and top hinge gave way. Woolf pushed the door to the side for Medina to charge in, Shiro right on his heels. He saw Keith being held down, someone on top of him—

 

“Get the _fuck_ away from him!” Shiro drove past Medina and brought his joined hands down hard on the base of the assailant’s neck. Medina grabbed his legs and pulled. Between them they broke his hold and Keith was able to scramble out of his grip. Celine darted around and pulled Keith with her toward the door as Woolf helped Shiro and Medina restrain the assailant.

 

The man whipped his head around and all three men reacted with surprised recognition.

 

Woolf spoke first. “Rivali? What in the bloody hell were you thinking, attacking a cadet?”

 

Rivali leered over at Keith and Celine tightened her hold on him, eyes flashing.

 

“Your call, Kogane. I suggest you tell your friends to let go.”

 

Two more shapes appeared in the door and a new voice intruded. “We just got three calls to this location. What is going on?”

 

\-----

 

Shiro didn’t move and the others followed his lead. As they watched, the campus safety officers took in the scene, three men holding a fourth man down…and a teenage boy with a torn shirt and red marks on his face that looked set to bruise, trembling in a girl’s arms as she hugged him and glared with the ferocity of a mother bear protecting her cub. They looked at one another and nodded.

 

“All right, gentlemen, hold him for a moment and let me get the cuffs on. You have a name, tough guy?”

 

“His name is Captain Alexander Rivali,” Shiro spat out, ice in his voice.

 

The officer nodded his thanks and cuffed Rivali’s hands behind his back. While he read out rights, the second officer stepped toward Keith.

 

“This your room, son?”

 

Keith nodded. The officer looked around, seeing the pizza boxes on the desk and the beer bottles on the fridge. “You know this guy,” he stated.

 

Keith nodded again and replied in a shaky voice. “He…he supervised me a couple of times, running flight simulations. He showed up tonight, saying I owed him…” He swallowed, trying desperately not to break down, and Celine pulled him close. He could feel Shiro’s gaze on him.

 

“You’re okay, you’re okay. You let me know you were in trouble.”

 

The officer pulled out a mini-tablet. “Here, can you two step outside a minute?”

 

They followed and Keith tried not to meet anyone’s eyes in the crowd of spectators. But he could feel a shift in the atmosphere from apprehension to relief as people took in both his disheveled appearance and the fact that he seemed uninjured. Celine refused to let him out of her arms.

 

The officer asked their names and jotted them down, along with Keith’s statement about Rivali. Then he turned to Celine. “How did you know to get these men and come here?”

 

Celine explained how Keith had used their roofie code in replying to her text. The officer looked impressed. “That’s very smart of you. So you were trying to let her know that you felt threatened.”

 

“Yes…yes, sir.”

 

“And I need to know how far he got in his attack.”

 

“Um…” Keith looked down at his mangled shirt. “Not far…I was backing up and fell against the bed. That’s when he got on top of me. He was holding me down when they got here.”

 

The officer took a quick look at his face and wrists, noting where bruises were starting to form. “All right. I have enough to file the preliminary report, but we’ll need you to come by the station tomorrow to complete it. What time works for you?”

 

“Um, I have two hours at lunch.” Keith shrank back as the other officer led Rivali out. Rivali shot him another glare, silently promising that he wasn’t finished.

 

“Okay. We need to find the residence director to block off your room and find somewhere for you to sleep until your door is fixed.”

 

Woolf stepped out. “We got it covered. If he can take his books and some clothes, he can stay at my place. That okay with you, Keith? Neil’s room is empty.”

 

Keith nodded.

 

\-----

 

Shiro had never needed one of his favorite mantras as much as he did now. _Patience yields focus. Patience yields focus._

 

He could see the officers’ assumptions as Celine held onto Keith and he clung to her. His own arms ached to pull Keith in and hold him, safe and secure, but having the officers’ unquestioning sympathy was invaluable. He noticed Celine trade looks with Woolf. When Woolf offered to have Keith stay the night at the townhouse, he realized that they wanted to reinforce the impression, hiding Shiro in the forest of friends. He needed to hold out, just a little longer.

 

“Shiro, could you help Keith get his things together?” Celine’s voice intruded on his thoughts.

 

“Yeah, sure.”

 

He and Keith assembled some clothes, his electronics and textbooks, and a few toiletries and let the officers make a list of what was being removed from the room. Shiro laid one hand on Keith’s shoulder and squeezed before stepping out and holding the door closed so he could get dressed. Then Shiro shouldered Keith’s bag and they left, giving Keith’s phone number to the resident director so he could confirm when the door was repaired.

 

Once they were out of the building and crossing campus in the darkening evening, Keith reached for his hand and clung to it. Shiro shifted so their fingers interlocked and pulled Keith just a little closer to him.

 

\-----

 

Finally, they were inside, away from the public eye. Shiro led Keith to the empty bedroom and dropped his bag on the bed. He reached for Keith’s hand, suddenly uncertain about embracing him. Would Keith want intimacy at this moment?

 

Keith solved his problem, slamming into him and burrowing in. Shiro closed his own arms around Keith as the younger man began shuddering. His voice was muffled by Shiro’s jacket. “I’m sorry…I’m sorry…”

 

Shiro pulled back slightly in shock. He put his hands to Keith’s head, directing his gaze up. “What on earth do you have to apologize for? You didn’t do anything!"

 

“I should have listened to you when you said officers and cadets shouldn’t…Rivali, he figured it out. The weekends, Jocko letting me into the bar, that girl in communications, she’s been talking…and now you could lose Kerberos if Iverson believes him!”

 

Shiro ran his thumbs down Keith’s face to his lips. “You have nothing to apologize for. I do not regret what we have here. Not for a moment. Rivali is the one in a world of hurt.”

 

“But he said if I didn’t…if I didn’t do what he wanted that he’d go to Iverson! He said you’d be off the Kerberos mission and that I’d be expelled!”

 

Rage surged through Shiro and he throttled it down. Right now Keith needed him.

 

“And what happened instead? You were smart enough to try and summon help and he got caught in the act. We have witnesses. We have campus police who will be on our side. Every cadet on your hall will be on our side. You are absolutely not getting expelled. And I will bring Commander Holt in if Iverson tries to use this against me.” He pressed his lips to Keith’s forehead and felt the tension in his boyfriend’s body begin to subside. Shiro wrapped his arms around Keith again, one hand in his hair. “You’re safe. You’re not going anywhere and neither am I.”

 

 

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you for reading! And if you went ahead and read this anyway without reading the source of the inspiration, seriously. Go. Shoo. Read.


End file.
